Rocket League Review (Switch)

Rocket League has been one of the most surprising success story of this generation. It was developed and released by an indie studio Psyonix. The release of the game is actually pretty crazy as it originally started as a beta that was later extended into the full game launching free for the PlayStation Plus subscribers. This is where the game basically exploded into popularity leading to a surge in the sales for the PC version. It was then later ported to the Xbox One where it continued its sales success and this is the first time the game has made its way to a portable in the form of Nintendo Switch.

Rocket League for the Nintendo Switch is an interesting case study for third party developers. It shows what kind of sacrifices that developers had to make in order to get the game running on Switch while hitting its target 60 fps frame rate. This is something essential to the game because of the promise of cross-platform play. Without it, I can’t image playing the game online because it would basically make it impossible to do cross-platform play with PC or Xbox One.

If you are long time player like me who is hoping for a portable version of Rocket League, look no further than this Switch port. It manages to retain all of the essential gameplay modes and the arena maps that have been released so far, however as our comparison between the PS4 and Switch reveals, it is not without a huge hit on the visual quality. This is understandable considering the hardware for the Nintendo Switch.

Rocket League for the Nintendo Switch comes with its own exclusive vehicles, just like it was the case on the Xbox One. This includes a Mario themed car including a separate design for Luigi and a car themed around Samus’ gunship from Metroid. However keep in mind that most of the vehicles are locked in the start of the game. They are thankfully not tied to loot boxes or other microtransactions but are still unlocked through a RNG. You will unlock new items or cars every time you complete a match and it won’t take you long until you have everything unlocked.

Rocket League on the Nintendo Switch has been reported to suffer through input lag and this is something that I wanted to keep an eye out for the review. It doesn’t appear to be the case here for me so far, although it seems that those who are facing this lag issue might be related to the patch, which the developers have said they are looking into it. Apparently the input lag is tied to certain TV sets. If you are facing issue with the controls, you can also try to change the standard control stick dead-zone setting from 0.5 to 0.05. This can prove to be helpful if you feel like there is an input lag with the JoyCon.

If this is your introduction to the world and gameplay of Rocket League, it will take you quite a while before you can fully master it. Rocket League is incredibly challenging in the start. You will have to get used to the physics and controls for the game. It is essential to learn how to utilize boost effectively to propel your vehicle to impossible to reach heights and kick the ball to the goal. If you think this is impossible to do in the start, relax. It might look hard at first but as time passes and you play more and more of the game, pulling out some of the more tricky moves becomes second nature.

Rocket League is best played in co-op with a friend and the Switch supports all of the essential modes of multiplayer. The simplified control scheme also works for a single JoyCon although it will take some time to get used to it since the acceleration and reverse is tied to the same triggers here. It works beautifully and makes Rocket League one of the ultimate co-op games to play for the Nintendo Switch.

Speaking of the online multiplayer, the ability to play cross-platform games with a PC or Xbox One user essentially means you won’t have to worry about the online population of the game. It is easy to find yourself within a match because there can be between 80 to 100 thousand users online at any point. Match making works well but the lag is greater if you use WiFi so using a LAN Adapter for the Switch is highly recommended if you want to reduce the lag.

Rocket League Review (Switch)

Game Reviewed on: Switch

Game description: Rocket League is a vehicular soccer video game developed and published by Psyonix. The game was first released for Microsoft Windows and PlayStation 4 in July 2015.

Summary

Rocket League for the Nintendo Switch manages to successfully capture all of the craziness of the game into a portable, but it is not a perfect port. The visuals take a hit and there are some minor issues that need to be ironed out.